Vignettes on Driving
by Zamiel
Summary: The adventures of Haruka and her car.  A project for stress relief.
1. Health hazards

Vignettes on Driving - Zamiel

I.

There is a certain regard in Haruka's face that concerns Michiru, a slight grind of the teeth, the furrow of eyebrows crinkling her forehead. It's not the anger that concerns Michiru; it is the aggression, the vehement absentmindedness with which Haruka turns the radio dial and dismisses channel after channel, settling on a sea of white noise before realizing no music is issuing forth.

"God," Haruka finally seethes after a long silence, "I hate this. I hate every part of it."

"Haruka, dear. It's only traffic."

A string of punctuated oaths is Haruka's reply, an abridged performance from that time three months ago when, for forty minutes, they'd tailed behind an old lady driving too slow in the fast lane. It was an improvement, Michiru reflects, but not by much.

"Darling, it's _only_ traffic. And you know what the doctor said – this sort of behavior is very bad for your blood pressure."

"_Damn_ my blood pressure."

"If you keep this up, you'll eventually get a stroke when you're older. And what'll I do? I'll be terribly lonely, don't you think?"

"You," Haruka snaps, crawling the car forward a good half an inch, "can finally throw yourself at that one actor you admire so much – what was his name again?"

"Oh my." The words drip colder than she'd intended them to, not that Haruka noticed or anything. "Yes, you are right, of course. I can always go do that. In fact, Haruka, perhaps I should go invest in buying a second home right away."

"What for?"

"A harem to house my arsenal of people to throw myself at, as you so eloquently put it. I already have a mental list compiled."

She bites the sides of her lips to hid a smirk as a visibly started Haruka, acknowledging the conversation for the first time, turns to stare at her.

"You wouldn't _dare_." A faint growl dots Haruka's phrase, a tinge of malice and jealousy that leaves Michiru satisfied for now. She imagines plucking it from Haruka's lips and tying it to her finger as some well-won trophy, a dazzling beautiful thing.

"Then I've just given you a reason to watch your health now, haven't I?"

The traffic starts to creep for all of two minutes before it is again brought to a standstill; Haruka opens her mouth to lash out but, thinking the better of it, quickly shuts it. "It's been a while since I've exercised," she finally manages to say, a slight strain caught in her throat. "I should take it up again soon…it'll be good for my blood pressure, don't you think?"

Michiru quietly places her hand on top of Haruka's own. "But you can't pull over _here_," she murmurs. "We'll just have to wait until we get home." Bemused, Michiru watches Haruka's face turn a delicate, flustered red, the color of which makes her smile.


	2. Baby you can drive my car

Vignettes on Driving-Zamiel

II.

"Driving a car is like making love to a woman. You start off gradually until you hear her purr, and then you really go for it and take her all the way."

Michiru smiles at Haruka's contemplative face. "Any woman?" she teases. "Or one particular woman?"

"I used the singular, didn't I? Woman, not women."

"Ahh." Sarcasm oozes from Michiru's tones. "Do I know this woman?"

"Just drive." Haruka settles back in the passenger's seat, something Michiru knows naturally causes her partner a great deal of anguish. For the past two days, Haruka had been teaching her how to drive, a feat that caused a slight strain on their relationship as Michiru—terrified of passing traffic, wide left turns, crossing deer, parallel parking, and going over 30 miles an hour—could in all probability reap an award for "worst driver known in existence." Haruka had completely lost her cool yesterday when, at a busy intersection, Michiru had accidently turned on the windshield wipers instead of the turn signal, nearly causing an accident.

"Alright. Here goes." Lowering the parking brake, she sets the car in motion, immediately perplexed when it starts to edge backwards. "What am I doing wrong?"

"Michi…" Haruka begins with an agitated sort of patience. "You set it in _reverse_."

Looking down, she sees Haruka is right. "Anyone can make that sort of mistake," she says to her defense, righting the stick shift. They cruise once around the block at a languid twenty miles per hour, Haruka sitting stiffly as the brakes squeal beneath them.

"I didn't want to say anything," she sighs at last, "but the way you are braking is very, very, very, very bad for my car."

"I'm sorry, darling," Michiru apologizes, a scant smile breaking over her lips. "Perhaps I don't know how to effectively make love to a woman."

Haruka ignores her, although Michiru's sharp eye catches a glimmer of a frown. "Alright, enough roundabout. Let's hit the main road."

"Are you sure I'm ready?"

"You were fine yesterday."

"Oh, was I? I was under the impression that I was failing miserably." She remembers being on the verge of tears as Haruka, constantly barking out different commands, finally ended with, "Don't worry, babe. I'll make it up to you when we get home." At the sight of Michiru's soft, tear-streaked eyes, Haruka had snapped, "I wasn't talking to _you_, I was talking to the car!"

"Just drive," Haruka says again and Michiru complies, knuckling down on the accelerator and screeching to a halt at the first stop sign. She hears a soft but distinct "goddammit" muttered under Haruka's breath.

The main road is blessedly empty on a Sunday morning and so Michiru is able to relax; next to her, Haruka's shoulder gradually sink down and she loosens the fists curled in her lap. "You're doing better today," Haruka finally says, a moment too soon as a truck goes by and Michiru, losing her nerve, slams down on the brakes right in the middle of the street, causing their tailgater to swerve and honk like no tomorrow. Michiru watches him mouth off in her rearview mirror; although she cannot audibly hear his speech, it is more than obvious the words he is screaming. Next to her, Haruka is giving a more watered-down version of the same kind of talk.

"Oh shit, shit, shit, _shit_. You could have made a big mess. _Dammit_, Michiru. That truck wasn't going to hit you at all! Why did you do that for?"

"Oh god." To her utter shame, Michiru starts to cry. The tears slowly peter down her cheeks as she works her way into a loud sob. "I can't do this, Haruka, I can't do this at all."

Haruka watches her cry, torn between exasperation and concern. "Fine," she says at last. "Let's exchange places."

A few minutes later, the car is purring at over 70 in a 40 miles per hour zone, Michiru collapsed into a sort of post-nervous fit in the passenger's seat. "I'm sorry," she mutters into the thick silence.

"Don't worry, babe. I'll make it up to you when we get home."

"I wish you would stop saying that to the car, Haruka. It makes me so sad."

"I wasn't talking to the car," Haruka sighs. "I was talking to someone."

"Someone? The woman you mentioned before? Do I know her?"

"I don't know." Haruka tries to keep her face set in a deadpan, but a visible grin lurks underneath. "Do you?"

"Lucky woman," Michiru sighs, tapping her finger on the glass.


	3. Are you there, God?  It's me, Haruka

Vignettes on Driving—Zamiel

III.

i.

"Haruka, we're at the bar, can you come pick us up?"

Haruka sighs, running one hand through her hair before pulling it in exasperation. "My car is not some royal carriage," she snaps into the receiver, making sure to send waves of disgruntlement through the wires. "And what are you doing at the bar anyway? You're hardly at the age to drink, you know!"

"Buuuut!" Amazing how Usagi's voice could sound even shriller over the telephone. "There was an attack at the bar! Some monster came and was about to tear the bartender apart until we stepped in!"

Oh, the irony of having to give underage superheroes a lift back home. Why couldn't they just vamoose like Superman? It was all so lame. "Where are you?" _I can't believe I'm doing this. I should be martyred. _She hears a sea of voices in the background, a collage of Rini-Ami-Rei-Minako - where the hell was Mamoru, anyway? That bastard, making Haruka do the clean-up work; she makes a mental note to chew him out later. "Where _are_ we, anyway?" Usagi was asking her friends. What an air-head.

"Ah, Haruka." Ami's sensible voice filters through the telephone. "Usagi put me on the phone to give you directions…listen, we're so sorry to bother you, we promise this sort of thing won't happen again…"

Ami melted into a list of apologetics until Haruka cut her off. "Look, just tell me where you are. I'll come pick you up," she adds with a defeated sigh.

"Oh _thank_ you so much, Haruka. We appreciate it so much."

Haruka listens to the directions, adding in a curt noise every now and then when the conversation called for it before slamming the phone. The noise rouses Michiru from the bedroom; tousle-haired, she totters to the door. "I noticed you didn't say good-bye to the person on the other end," she teases. "What's wrong?"

"I don't feel like talking about it." Sighing, she reaches for her jacket. "Listen, I have to go run this annoying errand but I'll be back soon."

"Don't stay out too long." Standing on her tiptoes, Michiru drapes her arms around Haruka's neck and gently pulls her down for a kiss. It made things a tad better, Haruka reflects as she inhales the scent of Michiru's skin still warm from the shower, but not completely better.

"Why the hell are we Sailor Scouts?" Haruka mutters into Michiru's forehead.

"Mmmm?"

"It's so much goddamn responsibility."

ii.

Five pairs of dimpled knees wink at her from the rearview mirror. Haruka had herded them all into the back—no one was allowed to ride shotgun, that was _Michiru's _spot—and like a clown car she'd wedged them in one on top of the other, a dizzy whirl of bows, boots, hair, heels. And worst of all, they wouldn't shut up. Immediately from the get-go her car was filled with the shrill, petulant whining of the Guardian Senshi, most of them clambering for more elbow room, arguing about something or other, or shouting questions at her. It brought to mind a story Michiru had told her about Beethoven, the great deaf composer whose world was filled with silence except the music in his own head. _What a lucky guy_.

"Haruka!" Rei was shrieking above the furor. "We're all so hungry, none of us had any dinner!" Apparently taking Haruka's stony silence as an invitation to continue, she plunged on. "Can we stop for fast food?"

This inevitably led to a chorus of "Fast food, fast food!" among a handful of them, and layered below that was another chorus of "You shouldn't bother Haruka like this! It's so shameful!"

Was it Michiru who once mentioned after this war was over, they'd sit down and consider having a kid? _Screw the kid_, Haruka reflects. "Alright, we'll stop somewhere on the way." Anything to make them shut up. This made them erupt into cheers so shrill that all the dogs in town were probably pricking up their ears. She maneuvers the car into a drive-through at the nearest McDonald's.

"Welcome to McDonald's, may I take your order?" asks the intercom in such a calm, organized manner that pangs of jealousy erupt inside Haruka.

"What do you guys want?" Haruka asks, instantly regretting it when they shout out their orders all at once, resulting in a garbled, shrill mess. She reminds herself to pick up some painkillers from the pharmacy once she's dropped them all off.

"I'm sorry, what was that?" says the intercom as the Scouts all pipe up in chorus again, Haruka rubbing her temples and on the verge of exploding.

"God! Shut up! SHUT UP!" she bellows, ensuing an immediate, hushed silence.

"I'm sorry, but that is very rude," says the intercom rather coldly. "I was just having trouble understanding your order, you see."

"Not you," Haruka snaps. "Alright," she continues, addressing the stunned Senshi in the back. "Tell her your order, one at a time."

"You…told us to shut up," whimpers Usagi, tears filling her eyes.

_Michiru, are you telling me we owe our allegiance to this kid?_ If Haruka had been in a good humor, she would have laughed. But right now the thought almost made _her_ want to cry. "Hurry up, now. Haven't got all day."

One by one the Senshi place their order in rather hushed, respectful tones, no doubt leery of upsetting Haruka again. As Haruka pulls up to the take-out window, a rather severe-looking worker greets her with a clipped, "Seventy-two dollars and eighty-eight cents, please."

"Cough up." Haruka waits for the girls to get their bearings together, until a tentative Rei stutters in the back.

"Uhh…Haruka…we're very sorry, but we all forgot to bring any money."

_Somebody kill me_.

"We'll pay you back, Haruka, promise!"

_Please, God. Just kill me right now. Please. If you are a merciful—_

"I didn't even think about it until this very moment!"

_-loving God, please take me away from this misery—_

"That's funny, neither did I! Heehee!"

_-or kill them. Yeah. Kill them. God, are you even real? Are you listening to me?_

"Seventy-two dollars," heaved the woman through her nose, "and eighty eight cents, sir!"

Haruka gingerly reaches for her wallet and surrenders a wad of bills. The Senshi watch the transaction with a quiet, respectful sort of awe, an atmosphere instantly dashed as soon as they receive their meals.

"Thank you, sir. Have a good night."

_If only._

"I got a Happy Meal!" "What did _you_ get?" "I don't like pickles. Anyone want to trade?" "Oh, this is going to be so bad for my figure!" "Hey, this is not my order! That is my order! Give that to me!"

_God, sorry to bother you again so soon but uh…did you get my last prayer? Or are you getting to it, after you fulfill all the ones you have to do today?_

"Why so quiet, Haruka?"

"Haruka's the coolest ever."

_I'd be flattered, but_… "Don't make a mess back there," she snaps, venturing a peek at the mirror.

"We won't, Haruka, don't worry!"

_I worry_.

iii.

She dumps them off at Usagi's house. "The rest of you walk home," she snaps when they start to protest. "I'm not a chauffeur!" And with that, she guns down the accelerator, choking on the scent of grease and cheap hamburger meat. She can't take a glimpse at the backseat without wanting to weep; it is hell back there, a dingy mess of wrappers, ketchup, crumbs littering the floor and seats.

Michiru is waiting when Haruka stumbles back indoors; she jumps at the sight of Haruka's bloodshot eyes and exhausted figure. "Goodness, Haruka. Come here." Wrapping her arms around her, Haruka melts into Michiru's embrace, sighing as Michiru's fingers gently weave through her hair and down her neck. "It's okay, honey," Michiru murmurs into Haruka's ear. "Tell me, what's wrong? What's troubling you?"

Haruka expels a long, disheveled sigh. "The car…" Immediately, Michiru drops the embrace.

"Oh, the car," she laughs lightly. "I thought it was something important." Smiling at Haruka's thunderstruck face, she glides away.


	4. Hello, Officer Is there a problem?

Vignettes on Driving—Zamiel

IV.

_It's such a beautiful day outside_, Michiru reflects, savoring the feel of the wind rushing beneath her hair and on her skin. _It's like a painting by Michaelangelo, gorgeous ephemeral clouds decorating the sky, Debussy in the car stereo, the smell of spring in the air…_ She glances over at Haruka in the driver's seat, carefully drinking in and enjoying every nuance, every little bit from the curve of Haruka's jaw and down the long neck, the collar of her shirt, her hands on the steering wheel. Such beautiful hands.

"Haruka." A contented sigh siphons from Michiru's throat. "I love—"

A sudden, violent squeal throws Michiru off-balance as the car lurches forward, Haruka gunning down on the accelerator. "Hang on!" Haruka shouts, laughing triumphantly as they shoot under the traffic lights and clapping the wheel in a self-congratulary gesture. Michiru scowls at her.

"Haruka, a yellow light does _not_ mean speed up!"

"Hey, we've got places we need to be!" Haruka looks into Michiru's frowning face and immediately softens. "Okay, you're right. What were you saying before that?"

Somehow the mood had completely disappeared. "Nothing."

"Oh?" answers Haruka dubiously. An uncomfortable silence pervades the air until Haruka sheepishly clears her throat. "I'm sorry. Did I do something wrong? Tell me."

There is a pang of apology in Haruka's voice that makes Michiru melt. "Haruka, I—"

"Wait," Haruka interrupts, "we can make it, we can make it—" She's eyeing the yellow light four blocks up ahead and driving her foot deeper into the pedal.

"Haruka!"

"It's not that far away!"

"Haruka!" Michiru shrieks as Haruka whips past the traffic lights, chortling and very pleased with herself.

"Did you see that, Michiru? It didn't even turn red yet!"

"God, Haruka!"

"What? What?"

Michiru sits tight-lipped as Haruka fishes for the right words to say, the silence between them broken by a siren blaring from behind.

"Shit," Haruka growls, pulling the car over. She glances over at Michiru who, oddly enough, is smiling. Michiru had a large collection of smiles, some sweet and some more alarming than others; this one clearly belonged in the latter category, a grim smug "You're going to get what's coming to you" plastered smugly across her mouth. Haruka watches the cop amble over towards them, dimly toying with the idea of throwing one solid "World Shaking" before jetting off.

"License and registration please, sir."

"Good morning, officer." Haruka puts on her most benign smile. _My, I didn't realize I was going so fast._

"It says here you are underage. And that you are female. Is this some sort of fake?"

"Oh my." Michiru's voice drifts lazily towards her. "However are you going to get out of this one, Haruka?"

"If you look at that license, you'll find I got it overseas. And for your information," Haruka snaps as next to her, Michiru gives a bemused chuckle, "I am a girl." She watches the cop's face for some startled sign, but he hands back her license without even so much a twitch.

"Do you realize you were going over 90 in a 30 miles per hour zone?" he asks in a stern Daddy Cool kind of way.

"I'm sorry, officer. It won't happen again."

"It better not," he answers darkly, "or else we're going to get that license revoked. Now I see you have a clear driving record and you have not been in any former accidents, and I really shouldn't be doing this, but I'm just going to write you up a ticket and let you keep that license. Don't disappoint me again, you hear?"

"Thank you, officer." _Dickweed._

He hands her the ticket, Haruka doing her best not to gawk at the enormous fine penned below. Michiru continues to sit in smug silence as they pull out and get back on the road, Haruka driving with strict discipline until the cop vanishes from sight; swearing, Haruka knuckles down on the accelerator.

"Haruka!" Michiru admonishes. Haruka laughs, a kind of jilting, maniacal laugh that makes Michiru wonder if her partner has gone insane.

"Yellow light," Haruka garbles, pointing up ahead.


	5. Shut up about driving

Vignettes on Driving – Zamiel

V.

(A/N: in which everybody gets more and more out of character with each chapter…poor Setsuna. I'm too evil)

i.

There were certain words that were banned from their household for the sake of preserving Hotaru's ears—four-letter curses were some, and then there were also normal words like vodka, terminal illness, debt, post-traumatic syndrome, all of which Michiru argued sooner or later Hotaru would have the bad fortune to learn at her own leisure, but now she was simply too young to be exposed to such things. Tacked at the end of the list was a recent addition: the word _car_ written in a flourish of red pen, angry loops decorating the sides, underlined twice, and two pointed exclamation points tailing the R.

"But that's unreasonable," Haruka protested, surveying the list. "_Car_ is a perfectly normal word that wouldn't bother Hotaru, it's listed here for _your_ benefit, Michiru. And for the life of me, I don't know why."

"Think about it," snapped Michiru, folding her arms and raising a twitch above her right eyebrow. "Sometimes I have the feeling you enjoy the company of your car more than me."

"That's ridiculous! I—"

"And it's not for my benefit, if you please. Cars are dangerous objects. They can cause fatal accidents to drivers, pedestrians, and animals. They wreak our ozone layer and pollute the air, something you of all people should put a little concern into, Haruka."

"This is the stupidest thing…then what am I going to say to Hotaru? 'Look at that nice motor vehicle?' 'Get into my Ferrari?' She'll know all these words for 'car' but won't know the actual word 'car.'"

"I don't see what's the problem. We'll just spell it out for her. Instead of saying 'car,' we'll say C.A.R. So she'll know the actual word for 'car' without saying it. And not another word," she interrupts as Haruka opens her mouth to argue. "From now on the word 'car' in this household is obsolete. Ka-put. Vamoose. Or face the consequences."

Haruka lifted an eyebrow at that. "Consequences?"

"Ever read Aristophanes' Lysistra?"

"Ly…what?"

"Maybe you should, Haruka," is Michiru's final smug contribution as she walks away.

That night, over a round of spaghetti (Haruka had the notion that Michiru handed her the undercooked bowl on purpose) they all discussed Hotaru's first day of school, the little girl babbling on about the activities they did ("Here you are, Setsuna," she'd garbled, handing the Pluto guardian a hideous picture of a multi-headed creature-looking-thing in lurid orange. "I drew a picture of you!" "Oh, my," Setsuna had replied with all-too-feigned delight) and her teacher, a lively woman named Ms. Carr. Haruka watched with amusement as Michiru's eyebrow twitched at every mention of the famed Ms. Carr.

"Not 'Carr,'" Michiru interposed at last. "Say C.A.R.R., Hotaru." Haruka rolled her eyes, an action that was immediately met with a sharp kick at her ankle.

"ARRRGH!" she hollered, dropping her spaghetti fork and causing a smear on the carpet. Everybody looked at her.

"You alright?" inquired Setsuna.

"Uh…yeah. Sorry. Bit my tongue." Glowering at Michiru, she bent over to retrieve her fork.

"Do you know how difficult it is to get stains out of the carpet?" asked Michiru coldly.

"I'll do it after dinner," scowled Haruka.

"But everybody else calls her Ms. Ca—" insisted Hotaru, silenced by a warning frown on Michiru's face.

"Everybody else is wrong, honey. It's actually C.A.R.R. Like C.A.R., but with one extra R."

"Oh," said Hotaru in puzzled agreement.

"Did you read the news today?" begin Haruka casually to no one in particular. "It was interesting. There was an article about some guardians who screwed with their kid's head, you know…experts say she developed a speech impediment and a general distrust towards the world…"

"Oh, I didn't read that article. I read the one about how those two famous musicians split up because they felt they couldn't agree on anything anymore," sighed Michiru. "And apparently, one of them spent more time with his inanimate objects than his lover, so she was naturally offended."

"How interesting. I read that the author of that article is extremely biased and has a fondness for taking things completely out of proportion."

"This is very good spaghetti," offered Setsuna as a means of conversation.

"I was also re-reading that one scene in Lysistra," continued Michiru, "where the women all agree to withhold sex until the men come to their senses."

"Isn't it strange," interrupted Haruka sulkily, "that the word 'sex' isn't banned from this household?"

"Sex is _about_ to be banned in this household," replied Michiru in her iciest of tones.

"What's 'sex?'" asked Hotaru with mild interest, moving the spaghetti around her plate.

"I particularly like the tomato sauce," commented Setsuna.

"Shut up," Haruka reprimanded her. "Your attempt to curtail the conversation isn't working." Curtly standing up to take her empty plate to the kitchen, she addressed Hotaru before moving away. "I would explain 'sex' to you, little kitten, but you see, that would involve using some words from the banned list—"

"Haruka!" protested Michiru.

"—and it really doesn't matter what it is anyway, as it's something that rarely happens," she snapped towards Michiru's direction. "Now if you'll excuse me, I think I'll go take a long drive in my motor vehicle, otherwise-known-as Ferrari, otherwise-known-as C.A.R.!" The last of these she punctuated with vengeance, slamming the door behind her. Michiru sat in stunned silence.

"More spaghetti, please," requested Setsuna meekly.

"Oh, go get it yourself," Michiru snapped.

ii.

Despite some chilled courtesy between Haruka and Michiru, they still managed to make their relationship work, and even in time, the term C.A.R. became a regular part of conversation with little bitterness attached. Setsuna, however, seemed to have the most difficulty adjusting to the term.

"Look, Hotaru!" she exclaimed one time at the grocery parking lot. "A blue C.R.A.!"

"It's C.A.R.," corrected Hotaru sweetly. Setsuna frowned and scratched her head.

"Is it, really? Ah, I'm never good at these codenames anyway."

In four weeks' time, it was time to go to the first semester's Parent-Teacher conference at Hotaru's school, and Michiru and Haruka agreed to go as her guardians, driving off as Setsuna waved ecstatically after them. "Good-bye!" she hollered, as though the two of them were off to war. "Be safe, write often!"

"Does Setsuna ever strike you as strange?" inquired Haruka.

"That's all the time-travelling, dear. It's bound to make you all confused."

Hotaru's school was a beautiful old building, the long hallways decorated with elementary-school children artwork. "How sweet," Michiru burbled. "Hotaru's painting of Setsuna got hung up! It really stands out, don't you think?"

"Sure does," Haruka genially agreed. "Very, uh, distinctive."

Ms. Carr was a little old lady with a great deal of energy. Haruka and Michiru took a liking to her at once. "Hotaru is doing wonderfully in her studies. For some reason, the art teacher is not so pleased with Hotaru's progress, but art is extremely objective, don't you think? For her basic skills—reading, arithmetic, science, geography—Hotaru is doing very, very well, above her peers."

"Thank you very much, Ms –" began Haruka, until a twitch from Michiru brought her to a halt. Clearly her throat, she attempted to rectify her mistake. "Miss. Thank you very much, miss."

"Ohoho. Please. I am nearly 60 years old, too old to be a 'miss,' although I appreciate it all the same. You may call me Ms. Carr."

"Yes, Ms. Carr," agreed Haruka feebly, noting in the corner of her eye the tremor of Michiru's hands.

"Which reminds me." A slight frown of consternation crossed Ms. Carr's tiny brow. "One peculiarity of Hotaru's is that she insists on spelling out my name. And not only my name, but also the word 'car.' I discovered that during reading hour, when I volunteered her to read aloud. It struck me as funny. Is there something I should know about?"

"It is a strange thing," Michiru agreed in a strained voice. "We'll discuss it with her."

When they exited the room, Michiru—to her own surprise—burst into tears.

"Hey, hey, what's wrong?" asked Haruka with alarm, pulling her close.

"I—oh, Haruka. I'm just so stressed these days, that's all. It was so ridiculous in there, wasn't it? Are we a normal family? Are we dysfunctional? Are we going about this all wrong?"

"You know," consoled Haruka, "you are doing an excellent job, darling. If only you would try to be more flexible. Like with the whole spelling-word-out spiel for instance. And whatever gave you the idea that I cared about my Ferrari more than you in the first place? Loving Michiru and loving that are two different things. One is expendable. The other," she continued, cupping Michiru's face, "isn't."

"Oh, Haruka." This led to a long kiss between them, amassing a crowd of kids who watched with wide eyes.

"Ewww," they squealed in chorus.

"What?" snapped Haruka. "Don't your parents do this?"

"Pay them no mind, Haruka." Linking her arm around her partner's, Michiru steered Haruka away. "You know, it's just that sometimes I felt like you spend more time and money on your Ferrari than on me. It's silly, I know, but I often feel like the secondary character in this crappy fanfic should be Haruka's Ferrari, not Michiru K./Sailor Neptune."

"Woah woah woah woah. You are totally breaking down the fourth wall here!" Giving her a quick kiss on her forehead, Haruka continued, "Listen, let's have a good night tonight. I'll take you out to a real dinner, and then we can go take a long drive in my car…" The word slipped out before she realized her mistake; shrieking, Michiru banged one solid fist into Haruka's chest and ran away, Haruka collapsing as the crowd of children cheered.


	6. Your Inner Child is Not Your Happy Child

Vignettes on Driving – Zamiel

VI.

It was that time of year Michiru secretly dubbed "the time from hell," where Haruka prepped to attend the annual Nagasaki Auto Convention, an invite-only group that got together to discuss vintage automobiles, luxury cars, motorcycles. It was, Michiru knew from first-hand experience when one year Haruka kindly invited her to tag along, the most boring convention ever known to man, a bunch of pseudo-elite suits who yammered on and on about the special functions of their carburetors, throttles, engines, and other technical jargon Michiru could make neither head nor tail out of; she had spent the latter half of the convention in the bathroom applying and wiping lipstick on and off again and again until Haruka came to fetch her out.

"Look at this stabilizer link I bought!"Haruka had crowed, and proceeded to show her a small, cold lump of metal in her hands. Michiru had stared at it for all of two minutes without speaking and Haruka, misinterpreting her silence, continued, "I know, I know, I had the exact same reaction when I saw it! Takes the words right out of your mouth, doesn't it?"

"Exactly," muttered Michiru.

"Dear, you've got some lipstick all to the side of your mouth…what are you trying to do, anyway? Painting on a clown mouth?"

"How much did you pay for it?" Michiru asked suspiciously. Haruka immediately sobered, shuffling to and fro on her feet in a kind of disjointed dance.

"We should go home. Setsuna and Hotaru are probably getting lonely…"

"Don't change the subject!"

"Well, thing is…it…may seem like a hefty sum if I just tell you out loud…but judging on the rarity of this particular model and its vintage condition, it was actually a bargain…"

"Did you," Michiru seethed, "hand away Hotaru's entire education fund?"

Relieved, Haruka ventured a laugh. "Don't be dense, Michiru, it wasn't the _entire_ education fund-" The sentence was broken by a sharp yelp as Michiru lunged for the stabilizer link, driving a deep elbow Haruka's stomach in the process.

Despite that setback, Haruka continued to attend the annual convention with all the fervor of a devout pilgrim journeying out to the Holy Land, and Michiru always watched her leave with sharp pangs of jealousy kicking up her insides before trying to convince herself that getting jealous over stabilizer links, carburetors, exhaust pipes, throttles, etc was not worth it. For some reason, she always remained unconvinced.

"I'll be off, honey!" Haruka's cheerful voice filtered through the air; sighing, Michiru prepared to give Haruka a proper sending-off. Prolonging the moment of theatrics when she'd fake herself into being the dutiful, smiling housewife bading her lover goodbye, she gave pause, sending a wan smile over to Setsuna walking into the livingroom.

"It's that time of year again," remarked Michiru conversationally.

"Oh, I know," answered the older Senshi in her most sympathetic tones. Michiru's heart warmed towards her, bathed in the mutual affinity, the both of them accomplices in their exasperation with Haruka and her hobbies, when Setsuna dashed it all to pieces with one sweeping sentence.

"Incidentally, what are we talking about?"

Time travel really _was _mind-addling. Rolling her eyes to the ceiling in a "why me" gesture, Michiru boosted herself off the couch and headed outside where Haruka was waiting.

"You know," began Michiru, "I always worry about you when you go to this conference."

"Oh, me too," agreed Haruka, a slight terror glinting in her eye. "What if that one Nagasaki dealer doesn't come? Then the whole trip will be completely wasted."

Romance was more than dead in this household.

Hopping into her car, Haruka rubbed her hands together before putting the key into the ignition. And then-

There was an enormous Bang, so loud that Michiru jumped and fell to the ground, and Setsuna came racing out with her staff in full tow.

"Put that away!" hissed Haruka, stepping out of the car and rubbing her head - she'd hit it hard on the ceiling. "What if the neighbors see?"

"Because I suppose the neighbors realizing that we are Scouts is much more devastating than being slaughtered by potential monsters," said Michiru dryly, despite her heart going haywire inside her. Sensing the sarcasm, Haruka frowned.

"Don't worry so much, Haruka. Besides, we can always tell them the staff is used for practical purposes," chirped Setsuna. Looking at the lavishly decorated staff, no plausible "practical purpose" – save that of burlesque pole - surfaced to Haruka's mind. The cloud of smoke rising from the engine only helped solidify the image.

Biting back a string of curses, Haruka opened the hood of the car and received a lungful of dirty air for all her trouble. And then, as emotion sank into her, she gripped the top of her hair and shrieked every single banned word Michiru had outlawed for the sake of protecting Hotaru's innocent ears – and not only that, but some words she uttered _twice_.

"It's _quite_ peculiar," quipped Setsuna, delicately fanning her nostrils, "but yesterday Hotaru and I were playing kitchen and poured some rice into the gas tank. We were pretending it was a cooker, see," she continued, "and isn't it lucky that the car didn't go off then? Otherwise we could have been seriously injured!"

"You," seethed Haruka, "poured rice into the gas tank? Were you being completely mental?"

"Oh honestly." Setsuna sounded very miffed at Haruka's words. "So we aren't creative geniuses. But what else could serve as a pretend makeshift rice cooker?"

Haruka put her head in her hands. And she knew it was horrible to think of it – but suddenly she understood why Sailor Galaxia was keen on killing other Sailor Scouts, and that split second of epiphany, she sympathized. This was months of planning down the drain, meticulous emails and phone calls and making absolute sure that the parts dealer she worshipped was going to come this year and sell out his entire stock before going into the bean farming business. _Bean farming business_, ye gods. The world was seriously messed up.

"Oh, Haruka." Michiru's chiding voice chimed in next. "Can't you go by bus or …"

"Michiru!" Haruka snapped. "It's an auto convention, and not any auto convention, but a damn posh auto convention, an _exclusive_ convention for god's sake, where people are admitted on an invite-only basis, and one of the rules is that you need to come in your own car. Go in on foot and kiss your membership good-bye."

"Can it be any car?" inquired Setsuna.

"Well…yes, technically. But we don't have another car. And the renting place thinks my license is a total fake." Suppressing a sob, she watched with trepidation as Setsuna whispered something into Michiru's ear. Michiru's eyes lit up, and she scampered off into the garage only to return with Hotaru's Playskool car.

"Get in, Haruka," she insisted, opening the narrow door.

"You're…" There was no adjective suitable to describe the scenario.

"Any car will do, right, Haruka? This is better than nothing."

Glowering at them, Haruka jammed one long leg in, squeezed her frame into the small car, and drew in her remaining leg. It was exceedingly painful. Her ribcage, she was sure, must have folded over in three places. Meanwhile, Setsuna and Michiru had burst into peals of laughter, Setsuna running inside the house to grab a camera and callously snapping pictures in quick succession, _snap snap snap snap snap_ as though she possessed a trigger-happy finger.

"These are going to be the cover of our Christmas cards this year," Setsuna burbled happily.

"Hey," Haruka protested, even though she only had about half an inch to move her jaw. The space was that tight. She attempted to walk towards Setsuna, dragging her feet on the pavement and painfully walking one mini step at a time. _Squeak squeak squeak squeak_.

"Oh Haruka, you look so silly!" sang Michiru. Haruka scowled at her; it was too rich a statement for Michiru to make – both she and Haruka were guffawing so hard that they were bent over. Haruka would be willing to bet a pretty penny that they looked even more ridiculous than she did, their usual regal elegance washed clean out of their systems. "Your legs are so long, Haruka – your knees look like they're tickling your ears!"

"They _are_ tickling my ears," Haruka snapped. Casting them one last death glare, she set out west, _squeak squeak squeak_ing laboriously as behind her, the women howled with laughter. When she was sure she was out of hearing range, only then did Sailor Uranus – tired, upset, pained – let loose a few tears. Unfortunately, the timing was still not yet quite right.

"Look, Daddy! It's one of those weird neighbors you keep talking about!" A little girl walking hand-in-hand with her father pointed straight at Haruka, both father and daughter staring dumbly at the sight of a grown-up woman squashed inside a Playskool car with tears streaming down her face.

Hastily _squeak squeak_ing away at .00009 mph, Haruka continued plodding away as the two ogled after her.

"Loonies, right, Daddy?" Haruka heard the girl say. "That's the word you used to describe them, wasn't it?"


End file.
